Speed2Design: Mission Control at JSC, Old & New

An exploration into the way NASA communicates with and controls the ISS as well as a glimpse into the space agency's rich history.

The day of the Speed2Design behind-the-scenes tour of Johnson Space Center was finally here! We all stood in the lobby, eager to get going, chatting about all kinds of cool technology we were hoping to see. Our shuttle arrived and we quickly loaded up, dubbing the shuttle that would take us to NASA, the "space shuttle."

The first area that we got a chance to see was the current Mission Control Center. This is where everything with the current space program is handled. You can see the multiple screens on the far wall with important information about the International Space Station (ISS). On the predominantly white screen you can actually see the commands being sent to the onboard computers in real time. On this particular day, the ISS was experiencing some issues with a cooling system so they were actively working on that. On the other screens you can see what was live video from the ISS, both internal and external.

Commands being sent to the computers aboard the ISS.
For a larger version click here.

After getting a chance to watch how things are currently run, and see some action on the screens, we were herded out of the press area and into a different section of the building. This time, we were going a bit beyond where the typical tourists go. The location is the original mission control room, which is now a registered historical monument, only instead of sitting in the press room, we got to explore.

The winners of the contest were almost completely silent as they slowly proceeded from the doorway into the room. Click through to the next page to see what the winners saw.

I saw the original Gemini mission control at Cape Canaveral in the spring of 1985 when it was on the "B" or second choice tour. Everything seemed from a different era even then - the digital clocks flipped little boards with number painted on them. The big map display on the wall moved a cutout of the Gemini spacecraft in front of a fixed map. The jumps from Gemini to Apollo to the space shuttle were all equally big. Our predecessors as engineers did great things with whatever was available to them. We should try to do as well as they did.

@Caleb, thanks for sharing your experience and the pictures. I am sure, being physically present there would have given you an astounding feeling, especially going back in the time. Few years back I got a chance to visit US on a business trip and my colleague there gave me a ride to the Air & Space museum near to Washington Dulles airport. Apart from many other exhibits (aero planes), there was a section for NASA's Space missions. It was an astonishing experience. I can imagine the feelings you might have got when you entered in the old command center!!

What do you mean by "NO intelligence"? You can make a general-purpose computer using magnetic drum or disk as its main memory. Yes, it's a lot slower than core memory or modern semiconductor memory, but it can execute instructions just fine. One of IBM's early machines was the IBM 650, which used drum memory. Writing code was challenging, because to get good performance you had to place your instructions on the drum so that the next instruction to be fetched would be coming up under the read/write heads just before it was needed. Otherwise you had to wait for another drum revolution. The 650 was Don Knuth's first computer (picture). I read somewhere that he came up with a great algorithm for optimizing placement of 650 instructions.

The USA Minuteman-I missile's guidance computer used a magnetic disk. One big advantage of magnetic disks and drums in nuclear missiles is that they are better hardened against radiation. I once held a surplus drum-based guidance computer from an early missle -- I don't remember which one. Beautifully engineered!

This is really a unique blend of history and technology, of the past and the future, to be able to see both the mission critical room of Apoollo and to get these choice images of the International Space Station. You and the others who won the contest are undeoubtedly very lucky....it's some sight to see.